Slow Pony Home
by TheRedPenofDoom87
Summary: Last Companion to "Old Coyote". Grace's last thoughts before she goes to Eywa. Rated for character death


_So here's the last of the Grace one-shots. It's kinda sad, but I wanted it to be happy too. Let me know what you think!!!_

_Disclaimer: I own nothing at all._

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"_**Setting free the anchor and looking past the shore/It's a sea of horses on ships with no sails, no motors, no oars"~ The Weepies "Slow Pony Home"**_

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**_It's funny, well not funny, but surprising, I guess, but I never felt the bullet. One minute I was trying to fasten the harness, the next I felt the hot blood oozing under my fingers. All I kept thinking was…that bastard. And I remember saying: "This is just going to ruin my whole day." But not much else after that. Everything's hazy now, especially since I keep drifting. Time doesn't seem to work. It stops and starts and moves almost without my knowledge. They sit next to me, holding my hand as I fade in and out of consciousness, telling me to hold on, Grace….hold on. Well, what do you think I'm doing?

I would never consider myself weak. Especially now. I grip every second with an iron grasp, thinking it might be the last. Part of me wants desperately to get better, if nothing else to kick Quatrich and Parker's asses myself and tell them "Told you so." There's still so much to see, so much to know. But God, I'd love to give in to the promise of the weightlessness, of freedom from this pain. I could just slip under the pain, and emerge new born into the nothingness…

Someone lifts the blankets I didn't know were on me until this moment and I realize I'm in one of the links, but they're made it into a bed of sorts. It's dark outside Site 26's windows and I don't know if it's the blood loss but it looks like we're moving…flying almost.

In the dim light, I can make out Jake's frown as he inspects the tourniquet that's almost soaked through. He goes for the nearest trauma kit; he doesn't know I'm awake. He does when he sticks in another hypodermic.

"Ow…" I grimace opening my eyes wider.

"Baby." Jake only smiles. "We'll be there soon….They can help you, Grace. I know it…." He goes on and on, but I've stopped listening. He's so different than he was when he came here. I remember sitting in the cell with him, ready to tear his head off. I wanted to scream: _What in Eywa's name were you thinking, you stupid Marine? How would this be okay?! You've ruined it! You've ruined her! What? Do you think she'll just get over you when you've gone? This is forever! And you've ruined her!_

But just as I was about to open my mouth, I noticed him laying his head in his hands, as if he couldn't bear the weight any longer. I closed my mouth and heard him muttering just under his breath over and over: "I've let them down….I've let them down…I've let _her _down…"

He didn't need me to say those things, he already knew them. So instead of screaming at him, I patted him once on the shoulder and curled my knees up to my chest and hid my face for a while.

Just like now, I realize. He doesn't need me anymore. He's figured it out. He has Norm and Max and Trudy and Neytiri. Especially Neytiri.

He grasps my hand. "Just hold on a little longer, Grace."

I press my other hand over his and search his eyes. Could I tell him to just let go? To let me let go? But he needs to keep pretending for a while longer and after all he's done for me, it's the least I can do. "Do you really think I'm going to let that bastard win?"

While Jake will be the hardest one to convince, Trudy already knows. A warrior who's seen many comrades meet their end this way. Her tone is quiet now; reverent as if I've revealed myself as some kind of holy saint. She keeps her eyes low and words few and far between. This is her goodbye, she doesn't beg me to stay or swear or rail against God or Eywa. She's going to watch me go with dignity; hers and mine. We've both come to terms with this.

"Grace?" Norm whispers as if he's unsure that I'm still here.

"I'm not dead yet, Spellman." I hiss and crack my eyes open. It's daylight somehow.

"I got the pen and paper you wanted."

I sigh, fighting for the strength. "Take this down: my password is f.i.d.g.e.t. 1565." Norm looks curiously at me. "It was my cat's name." I answer his unasked question.

"Where is he now?"

I shrug. "With my ex-husband. On Earth. And the combination to my room at Hell's Gate is 25-31-3. In the bottom of the dresser by the bed-"

Norm set the pen down, sitting back in his chair. "Grace, why are you telling me this?"

"Will you just write it down?" I hissed.

Norm crosses his arms over his chest, waiting.

"There are things…"I fight for breath. "Journals I kept that I want in trusted hands."

"You're going to be fine." He insists but there is that edge of fear cutting his words. He's seen the way Trudy looks at me.

I close my eyes as the room spins. "I've lost too much blood, Norm…way too much without a transfusion in the next few hours."

Norm pales. "But…you said-"

I know what I said!" I snap. And then am instantly sorry, when I feel the terror starting to leak from him. "But….I'm so tired, Norm. I'm so God damned tired."

Norm shakes his head. "We need you, Grace."

"No…no you don't." I say quietly, admitting it out loud for the first time. "You have each other and Max and the Omaticaya."

Norm picks the paper and pen back up, hesitantly holding it over the paper.

"Don't tell Jake about this until…after…" I want him to promise. He needs to keep hoping for a while.

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"Look…look where we are, Grace," Jake murmurs and it's twilight suddenly. I open my eyes and see his huge blue face floating above me, his arms securing my frail body.

And above him, the hanging branches of the Tree of Souls. Apparently, Jake isn't the only lucky swine now. "I'll have to take some samples…"

Jake smiles a little as we draw closer and closer to the tree. And there waiting for us, are Mo'at and Neytiri, worry plain on their faces. But what little breath I have left, gets stolen away by the beauty of this place.

Jake lays me down next to my Avatar body that lies curled like an unborn child, not dead but not alive either. I want to reach out and touch it but don't have the strength. Maybe to reassure it that I'll be there soon.

"She must pass through the Eye of Eywa…"Mo'at was telling them…and me, I suppose but I just can't focus. The light from the slowly appearing stars diffuses among the glowing branches of the Tree. It moves in swirls and arcs and I try to trace it with my hand. But I don't even have the strength to lift my wrists. "She is very weak…." Neytiri or Mo'at murmur.

"Grace!...Grace…?" Grace…who is Grace? I don't know who Grace is….who am I?

_You are you_ a lullaby voice insists from the void, from the light, the dark…I don't know… _A name is just that: a name_.

_Who are you?_ I wonder but I realize my mouth isn't moving.

The seashell pink light grows brighter and brighter, now there are streaks of white and gold and shadows that seem to stretch forever. Somewhere in the amalgam of light and dark comes a form, a form for which I have no words. Her eyes are the bright jade of the forest and the soft cerulean of the Pandorian sky and her smile stretches for miles, gentle and nurturing.

_Eywa? _I whisper in my thoughts.

A gentle chuckle washes over me, soothing my nerves, the pain. _It is but a name. I am all that is, all that was and all that will ever be. See…_

I See, with eyes that are not mine, all the Na'vi that are connected to the Tree. I See their hopes, dreams, nightmares, the love for their children, mates and for Eywa for all things that grow and live. I want to immerse myself in this love and lose myself entirely to it.

_I am more than that_.

In a place far from the Tree, I am a thanator taking down a limping hexepede. The hot blood rushes against my lips as I rip and tear.

I ride the wind as an ikran, the air cool and clear on my wings.

I am the water flowing down past the ruined Hometree, wearing down the stones in the bed as I have for millions of years.

I am a tree thirsty for rain.

_And more still._

Neytiri and Jake stand side by side, hands linked. And I can see a brilliant light that jumps from their skin. It forms a shape, that I know the name of but can't remember, around their wrists which links them together. They can see each other's thoughts, sense each other's moods. Feel more deeply than any human being ever could. The love I once wanted to condemn him for shines between them, as if each were a mirror to the other.

_Lucky swine_, I smile. I never felt like this for my ex, not even an inkling.

_Do you See? _She asks and her voice is like the sea and the sky all at the same time; sighing and musical. _Do you understand?_

Neytiri grips her mate's hand; the light intensifying. She can feel me slipping away with every passing second. She knows. And she doesn't have the heart to tell _her_ Jake. Because she never wants to cause him an instant of pain.

_And here is the secret that you must understand_

Neytiri looks down at my human body, sensing that I am no longer quite as attached to it as I once was. Her thoughts come flowing into me. While her mind is alien, and is formed so very differently; she still cannot fully comprehend why we're here, why we destroyed her home, or even why Jake, Norm and I are different than our companions. There isn't a reference point for her, except for all the old stories she's heard about before the Na'vi stopped fighting one another.

She glances over to her Jake, and I'm overwhelmed by their connection. The light that spins around their hands brightens even more. It's almost too much to bear, too much to try to understand. But somewhere in the swirling lights and the growing voices of the Na'vi, it comes to me.

I realize the Na'vi feel just as deeply as humans do. Perhaps even more so because they have not forgotten where they come from. Whom they come from. They see the world, Pandora, as it is not how they wish to see it. Neytiri loves Jake for simply who he is; not for what he is. Human, marine, alien, dream walker, Torok Makto…those are just names. He is more still.

I intake a deep gasping breath and open my human eyes. The forest, the trees, the Na'vi…the Jake, Neytiri, Mo'at, Norm blur together in a swirl like the Milky way but blue and pink… no pain now…none…I float in Eywa's wide engulfing hand. From high above her eyes; one blue, one green, crinkle in an all knowing smile.

"Grace?" Jake's voice is so far away. "Grace? Can you hear me?"

"I…," my throat is dry. I want to tell him the great secret but the only thing that comes out is: "I see Eywa, Jake…She's beautiful…" I can't find the right words.

_Come…he will know soon enough. Come._

"Grace," he is panicking, I feel it slide against my skin like electricity. "Grace, hold on! Grace….!" But I'm too far away…falling down through the ground, the roots of the tree but flying too. Voices of the Na'vi ancestors cry out in joy as I come closer and closer.

Suddenly, as I fade away into the mass of singing voices, the light and the dark, I remember the name of the symbol that encircled Jake and Neytiri's wrists: Eternity. There is no end, no beginning and nor does it seem to matter.

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_So??? R&R does not stand for rest and relaxation!!! Read and Review please!!!_


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